Old Holey Sock Rug

So, years ago I realized that we were throwing away all of our socks that had holes in them. Hmmm, there has to be something that I could do with those socks. So instead of throwing them away, I started collecting them in a bag.

We tried a few things and nothing was really great. The socks were stashed away to think about again on another day. In the last few weeks I ran across my stash of socks and began to experiment again. I ended up with this rug!

Here is today's keeper version of my holey sock rug!

 

What I did:

1. Cut socks into strips so I had loops of socks. I found that 2-3cm worked best. I avoided the really thin areas and where there were holes. For the top ribbing, I discarded that or cut it open so it wasn't too think. (The boys helped do this while I was reading to them.)

2. Then I created yarn by connecting the loops together with a cow hitch. Make sure that you pull the knots tight. I had some colored socks and some white socks. I chose to have four white loops and then one colored loop.

3. Then I knitted with the yarn. I personally cast on 21 stitches onto size 18 needles and then did a knit, pearl, knit pearl pattern across the row and the same on the other side.

 

I ran out of my sock yarn at a pretty good size of a rug. 57x61cm.

 

What I learned:

- Lots of lint! Cutting socks creates lots of lint. Unknown how much the finished rug will still sluff. I have put in the dryer to gather some of the lint off of it.

- Different socks will react very differently and make different sized stiches. After version 1, I re-created all of my yard so different types of socks were more distributed.

- It takes lots of socks! My finished rug weighs round 2.5 pounds.

 

Version 1 - lots of size and texture variations. I did knit pearl, knit pearl on one side and pearl, knit, pearl, knit on the other side.